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Johnson blip may not presage recovery

That green shoot could wither
Old friend Johnson Service (JSG), a shrinking mini-conglomerate whose most visible business may be its dry cleaning chain, published its annual report last month.  A year ago, I described its gradual meltdown:
…the drip-drip-drip of collapsing ambition, rising costs, falling margins, resignations, dividend cuts, write-offs, profit warnings, refinancing and ultimately dramatic recovery, [...]

The cheapest six stocks in November

Here are the cheapest six stocks in November, as measured by Dr Keith Anderson’s Naked Price Earnings ratio:

As I’ve described many times, this measure boosts the predictive power of the PE by accounting for a company’s long-term profit record, its size, and its business. In other words, companies with low PE ratios do slightly better than companies [...]

Fractal finance and the dull thing about buses

Looking back on my notes on Darwen (DHP), here are some quotes from the 2006 accounts of Optare*1, the bus company Darwen is buying on July 14 may be buying (*see below), that reveal a slightly more downbeat view of the bus biz. My notes follow them:
The market for new passenger vehicles is relatively static [...]